People who know the volleyball landscape better than I do: How secure are our chances of getting an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament should we not win the MAC tournament?
Depends on where we bow out in the tourney and how it ends up affecting the RPI. The cut-off for for at-larges is normally around 46-49 in the RPI. Coming in to this week's matches, we are 42 in the RPI (Ball State was 45).
If we lose in the finals to BSU, odds are we would still probably sneak in. Anything outside of that may be tough.
To return to this, the RPI this week has OHIO bumped 7 spots to number 35, but Ball State getting swept over the weekend (with one of those to RPI 200+ Akron), a loss in conference hurts us even more. However, one loss in the conference tourney would more than likely not drop us low enough to miss out on the tourney entirely.
The MAC now plays a big part in the chances of some bubble teams around the country. If Ohio loses the conference tourney, the MAC will be a two-bid league, and that takes away an at-large spot.